Last Day of Freedom

Slept in. Surfed the web. Now I'm off to the pool and then an afternoon and dinner with a friend I haven't seen in 6 months. Not a bad way to spend the day.

Oh, and the cold retreated.

Law School Rant No. Cuatro?

The web site. It appears that one of the faculty members secured their 5th grader a "Learn HTML in a summer" project, which became the school's web site. It doesn't work in most browsers, it's ugly, the menus often don't display. I'm certain the fifth grader is now a 7th grader with HTML experience and is ashamed of her work. I'm also certain that my school can no longer afford her going rate. So, IT maintains the site with an apathy that is palpable while surfing. I can only hope that they make good on their promise to post our section assignments and schedules today. You see... I'm very excited to start school. {laugh} Yup, I'm a geek. Always have been. At least I no longer have the HUGE coke-bottle glasses with large plastic rims that I was forced to wear when I was in 5th grade. Contacts are a good thing.

Latest SCO news

SCO has terminated Sequent's Unix License. I've never heard of anyone actually using Sequent Unix (Dynix/ptx). Doubt it's really a problem for IBM, they'll probably just brush it off like all of the other SCO annoyances.

On the mend

Slowly. I don't want to make any sudden movements. In fact, I don't want to move at all.

Check out the Google logo today. It's Al's Birthday.

Mutiny!

My body let the virii take over, or at least, I've lost control of my nose and head. I can only hope the rest of my body will fight back and eventually reclaim the vessel.

Last night, I was hot, cold, and full of snot--sometimes all at the same time. So, I couldn't get in bed until 2 AM, and then I just tossed and turned until I removed myself from the bed for E's sake. I watched the rest of Primary Colors at 4 AM when I moved to the couch for good. At 7 AM, I woke again, incapable of sleep, and watched The Accused. I fell back asleep at 9:00, to wake at 10:00, and watch Some Like It Hot. This is not exactly what I had planned for my week of blissful freedom. I only get 3 netflix at a time. Not to mention that this is particularly devastating to my ideal work out schedule. You know, that week of working out would have magically been able to transform my body into a lean, mean, law student machine--envy of all in my section. But, now that I'm just not healthy enough to pull it off...well, I might as well give up and stick to my existing wardrobe and body type. Too bad, the awe-inspiring physique would have been fun.

All in all, I suppose it's not that bad. Sure, I feel like a**, but 3 movies in 24 hours is pretty indulgent. And, I did manage to clear a few chores off the list yesterday before the assault was in full effect. Given that I HATE being sick when I should be working, I guess if I had to be sick, this is the best option. So, today will consist of me trying to take care of more chores, which require physical effort, and realizing that I am just too weak to handle them. At that point, I will curl up on the couch with The Left Hand of Darkness and finally finish making my way through The SFRA Science Fiction Short Story Anthology. It's not a bad way to spend a day at all... hiding from chores and devouring brain candy in preparation for the weeks of substance I'll be reading very shortly. It's almost nice to have an excuse to put off the chores. Of course, I think I'd rather my nose stop dripping and my head stopped pounding, but I suppose I can pound liquids and vitamins in hope of that for tomorrow.

Wish me a speedy recovery, I may not be so cheery 'bout this whole thing tomorrow.

Ahhh...

The vacation consisted of 7 wineries and 2 days of nothing but good food, wine, gorgeous countryside and conversation with friends. I'm very relaxed.

If you ever happen to be looking for a restaurant in downtown Paso Robles (Say, for example, if you are taking the 101 from the San Francisco Bay Area to Santa Barbara), YOU MUST GO TO ALLORO. The food was superb. I decided not to have risotto ai frutti di mare (my standby) in favor of gnocchi piemontese, which was divine in two ways: one, the gnocchi was perfectly formed and consistently light; two, the sauce was a drool-inspiring balanced combination of strong mushrooms, tomatoes, cream, and several herbs. The risotto, ordered by one of my friends, came in a gargantuan dish, and it was just as good if not better than my gnocchi, both in al dente consistency and in balance of fresh seafood/shelfish with the lighter flavors of tomato, wine, and herbs. The two other diners in our party had homemade spinach ravioli and they raved as much as the rest of us. Tiramisu was excellent, as was the after diner coffee.

The food was amazing, but more importantly, this restaurant that we chose by rock-scissors-paper turned out to have a wine list that has received the "one of the best wine lists in the world" award from The Wine Spectator. Mind you, a good wine list in my estimation includes values--good wine that costs very little and is only appreciated by people who happen to be adventurous enough to try it despite its lack of prestige and popularity. So the best part about Alloro according to me? They had enough variety and quality on their wine list that I was able to order a bright and cheery Valpolicella from Veneto and a clean, fruity white Fruili (pinot grigio) for a total of $40. Two bottles of excellent wine, in California, at a nice restaurant, for under $40? I was in Heaven. Fruili, in particular is wine that I love to buy in Italy for EU 8-10. Several times, I have asked, where could find this value wine in the US. Always, the response was a laugh, and "Beviamo tutti qui, in Italia." (We drink it all here, in Italy) Apparently, a few bottles make it to Alloro. Go try some.

In blogland, blogger gave the archives back, so I guess I won't migrate to MT this week. I also managed to get comments up on the site, via Haloscan. Very easy instructions and script generator. If you're looking for a friendly comments host, I recommend 'em. If you're solvent, I recommend donating.

This week promises to be full of sleeping in, catching up with friends before I disappear into the black hole of school, working out, taking care of chores, more good food, drinking some of the wine from the trip, and, of course, more relaxing. Monday, my new life begins.

Audi

So...almost...done. It's a fabulous feeling. I haven't had a vacation where I was honestly free from professional commitments for well over a year. And boy, am I looking forward to it.

I just want to leave and start my vacation immediately, but alas, I'm waiting on feedback and an IDS from my admin. I will be signing documents and sending them out the door on the very last minutes of my time here. At least I know I'm useful.

I think while I wait for stuff to come back to my desk, I'll go get my admin a thank you card.

Things are warming up

IBM and Novell finally got annoyed, grabbed arms, and started retorting their own version of "Red Rover, Red Rover, let SCO come on over."

Another article has this snippet, and I couldn't agree more.


Unlike SCO, IBM has been very careful not to make inflammatory statements. So when IBM fires a broadside it is a very carefully prepared action, which will be very carefully executed," said Gary Barnett, principal consultant at Ovum. "If SCO is wrong, IBM is absolutely right to ask for compensation."

"IBM has more patents than anyone, and more money and more lawyers than SCO. SCO will be bled dry before it can make its case," he added.


SCO seems quite like the spoiled schoolyard brats who whine and threaten when they aren't getting their way, but really, they don't have much in the way of toughness, so it's all idle threats. Good thing IBM is on the side of the GPL, I would not want the players to be reversed.

Will be Missed

RIP to the "other" sua sponte, antillico, learned foot, bloody nub, et. al. over at Open and Notorious.

I'm gonna miss 'em. Most of us law blogging types are just too damn boring, conservative, scared, or old-in-the-soul, to live and write with the flava of those chicks.

Here's to hoping their submit an honest review of your law school effort gains momentum. It's a much needed resource. I'll be posting one of these frustrated weeks in the near future, no doubt.

Uggghhh...

Several months ago, I sent a letter to both of my Senators regarding Maher "Mike" Hawash, and his detainment as a material witness.

Yesterday, he plead guilty to one charge of conspiring to contribute services to the Taliban. His plea agreement details his actions.

I, like many people, am irate at the fact that Mr. Hawash, an American citizen, was held for 5 weeks, without charge. More information on the material witness statute and several other articles are available at the Free Mike Hawash Links Page.

What has me the most upset? The government has overstepped their bounds, but, they did it in the case of someone who plead quilty. I fear that his guilty plea will go far in silencing the people who should be arguing with the government's actions on principal.

I don't subscribe to the theories that he was coerced or tortured by the government. He plead guilty. But just because he plead guilty after the fact does not mean that he should have been denied his rights of habeus corpus beforehand.

I can only hope that this type of investigation and holding of American Citizens in direct opposition to the Constitution will be a checkered past we've overcome in the very near future.

Cartoon California

Wee....

How can you not feel a sense of childhood when confronted with a reality like this? (link to calblog--awesome coverage of the CA governor madness) The government system is NOT functioning according to plan. It's alice in wonderland time, kids.

And, as I said before, I'm not actually all that upset about the fact that Arnold'll most likely be governor of this fine, hilarious state at some point in my lifetime.

In fact, I think I may even vote for him.

SCO's blackmail

Give us $699 now for a single processor machine and we won't sue you later. After October 15th, it'll be $1399.

SCO Group's contention is that it needs to collect fees from users for its intellectual property because vendors such as IBM and Red Hat Inc. don't indemnify their customers against intellectual-property infringements contained in the Linux kernel. "There's a shell game going on here about legal Linux liability," McBride said. "The rock is showing up under the shell of the end user. Vendors have shifted liability to their customers. IBM and Red Hat have painted a Linux liability target on the backs of their customers."

Or maybe, you can't win picking on people your own size, so you're picking on the little guy.

Obviously, the comments are raging on slashdot.

Useful Patent Links

So, I've spent quite a bit of time on PAIR at the USPTO.

And, I've used IPDL at the World Intellectual Property Organization (note that both of the previous links have the cool country code of "int").

But, today, I discovered http://ep.espacenet.com/, which is a free search engine where I was able to find abstracts for my EP, GB, and WO patents all in one pop.

No time to talk

Finished the shots today (adult polio vaccine, apparently the childhood one doesn't count), so I suppose they have to let me show up now.

4 days of work left. Too much work to count.

Very much looking forward to my mini-vacation in central california wine country. But, that's not 'til Friday, after I've finished all my work (I hope, I hope, I hope). Back to my reading. Eyes front.

Poke, Poke

Law School Rant No. tres:

My law school wants records of my immunization since birth. And a physical. And a medical history.

But, I'm opting out of the school's insurance, I have my own doctor, and I don't want to give up any of my private medical information. Not to mention the fact that I wasn't too stoked to take my healthy self to the doctor for a cheesy check-up that required the following:

1. Breast/Prostate exam (Wha???? This is actually the main cause of this rant. I don't get it. Aren't most law students in their 20's? Aren't these tests for cancer? Why don't they require other cancer tests? You know, a head scan? Lung scan? I just don't get it.)
2. Immunization records for Measles, Mumps and Rubella (Fine, I think this is a bit silly for anyone born and educated in the US, since it was required in order to enter grade school, but fine. I can respect this one. It's just a pain to bother my mom and ask her to find the records.)
3. Hepatitis A and B immunization records? (Oh, so I don't accidentally donate or accept untested blood from a fellow student? Or perhaps they are going to post Hep A/B infection rates somewhere on campus so that if you want to hook up, you can check the list first. Of course, there's no other STDs on the list, so I'm not quite certain how useful this would be. What could possibly be the logic here?)
4. Tetanus booster within the last 10 years. (Okay, so this is a good idea for your health. But does the school have a habit of leaving rusty needles on the floor? Perhaps the desks bite gunners who move too quickly? I think I'm grumpy about this one because I hadn't had a booster in 10 years, so now I have a very sore left arm. Damn.)
5. 4 vials of blood drawn for various immunity tests and 1 sub-cutaneous injection for the TB test.

The arbitrary choice of immunization and infection tests gives credence to the often-cited theory that grades are just random. Sure, there's some stuff that makes sense, but at least half of it is absolutely silly.

Also, I can now say that the pain of law school has commenced. It is currently residing in 3 poked holes in my arms.

The bad guy does some good

For reasons relating to technical incompetence, their we-don't-give-a-f**k-about-you attitude, and of course, the infamous browsing with frames patent, I *hate* SBC.

Note: I don't use the term hate lightly. I'm harboring serious acrimonious feelings towards that organization

But now, I find myself in their cheering section. In fact, I may just become a fan. If they're willing to fight the good fight against the DMCA on constitutional grounds... I can probably forgive their previous sins. Of course, the forgiveness is contingent on the SBC IP team keeping their ridiculousness in check.

And, with a hard look at the previous sentence, I'm not certain I'm going to be the best IP lawyer. I'm all for using the law to defend technological rights that actually belong to you. But that's pretty much where it ends for me. I don't think the patent system should be a big land grab where every company should take everything it can get, regardless of whether they actually invented the technology. I'm certain that this viewpoint will be a problem with some of my future clients. Oh well, I can only hope that there will be enough unslimy work to keep me busy.

The things that bind us

Mom promised that when I got to college I would meet more kids like me, and I wouldn't feel so alone. She was right, I met more, meaning some, who shared my interests and/or quirks. But I still felt pretty damn alone--I was grumpy at her for being wrong. During my tech career, I met still more people with some of my interests, but I became used to feeling alone. Now, I think I'd feel wacky if I didn't feel unique and alone.

However, one of the bad things about this is that it's been a rare occasion when someone I respected appreciated me for what I wanted to be the most appreciable parts of me.

In that vein, I am delighted to learn that Salam is a Gibson fan. Even more excited by the fact that they are mutual admirers.

Dragging

Advice to future summer associates: If you end up at a firm that believes in working its summers pretty hard, watch the work that you accept towards the end of your stay. That cool project becomes much less cool when you are staying late to finish it before your time is up and missing plans with friends as a result.

I took on about 4 days too much work. With a week and a half to go, and only having worked one Saturday all summer, I'm in slightly over my head. The remainder of my time at the firm will be slammed. Hindsight...

Found Stuff

So, I was meandering around the student blawg space and stumbled across a few things worthy of mention.

1. Dylan goes to law school is a new blog from a technophile 1L2B--seems that we are quite prevalent.
2. Law Meme makes fun of student's ridiculous note about Eldred v Ashcroft. Generally, I don't like name-calling. But in this case... preach on brotha man.
3. Undeniable dilemma, another technophile newcomer rambles about the importance and difficulty of living your life for you, your loves, your future, today, and what not
4. Waddling Thunder discusses the need for blog discretion in the face of a possible google-collision between reality and the blogosphere on the monitor of a future employer.
5. Jeremy recently touched on the google-collision concern, as well.

As for #4 and #5, I think I'm glad I chose to go with my original instinct about relative blog anonyminity. Often, I'm jealous, because it does feel cowardly to state my opinions behind the green curtain.

It's particularly frustrating to watch my words when I know that it is almost impossible to write biographic content without somehow giving up my anonyminity to people who know me well. And, to anyone who really wants to figure out who you are, there are never enough disguises. But, I guess it's my hope that by monitoring the identifying data that I post, I won't find myself in a situation in a few years where I'll be forced to chose between my audience, history, and the level of honesty that I've chosen. I'm sure many a 1st ammendment scholar would complain about my self-censure, but I tend to think self-censure isn't always a bad thing.

Not telling Layla that her new yellow dress makes her look significantly larger than the old outfit that she wore yesterday, for example. I find that type of self-censure to be an excellent use of judgement, and in general, just a good thing. (patting self on the back...)

I Had Good Intentions

As a favor to a friend's company, I agreed to make a few quick edits to their website. What do you know? Qwest has some sort of block on their /htdocs directory so that uploaded files are not immediately published. So, I've been sitting on hold for 30+ minutes listening to upbeat jazz. I keep telling myself that it could be worse. It could be musac.

So, while I laugh at the lame situation I'm in, I'm reminded that while I do miss many things about my former employment, holding for a technical support monkey, and then dealing with the inevitable abuse that the monkey will deal out in order to make up for its technical ineptitude is not one of them. And yes, I'm aware that some technical support people are not monkeys. But, statistically speaking...

Perhaps the memory of sitting on hold right now and whatever ridiculousness ensues will serve me well when I'm dealing with the equivalent annoyances that law school will undoubtedly bring.

Where should I go to Law School?

Sua Sponte offers some heartfelt advice about going to the best school where you are accepted.

So, in contrast, I'd like to offer the my friend, C's, story...

C is a California native, a Cal grad (that's Berkeley for those of you who are confused), who recently got her JD from the Univeristy of Michigan. She applied everywhere and went there because it was the best school where she was accepted. She packed up her stuff, moved several thousand miles and spent the her 1L year suffering through the socratic method in addition to MAJOR depression due to the environment (good food? culture? what?), the weather (snow? ice? no sun? what?), and distance from her support network. Her mental and physical health suffered severely, her grades most likely did as well (although she still did quite well... type A that she is), her marriage took a serious beating due to the commute from her husband's job, and her relationships with friends and family, most of whom she was unable to see in person, were not as able to help her through this difficult period as she would have liked. She ended up as a visiting student at a MUCH lower ranked school for a year out of her law school journey to be able to make it through the experience with her sanity. Her advice to me was to consider ALL of the quality of life factors, both those during school, as well as those afterwards, when deciding where to go to school because she felt that she was living proof that the "go to the best school where you are accepted" adage can be horribly wrong. It can also saddle you with a very large chunk of debt if the "best" school is out of state or private.

As for myself, if my experience (albeit short) has shown me anything, contacts I made in business prior to deciding on going to law school will most likely affect my future legal career much more than the school that I choose to attend. Over the course of my summer, I've had the priviledge of working with over 40 attorneys from 4 differnent firms. Each one of them is their own story. Some of the most brilliant and successful attended schools of which I've never heard. I've met senior partners from all walks of the law school ranking system.

So, yes, everyone has heard the saying, "you go to the best school where you are accepted," and most people will assume that you followed it. Know this when you are deciding where you will go. But, I would say that it's really just a question of whether you define best to be the rankings applied by USN&WR or, rather, whether you have your own criteria. It is important to note that if you change your criteria, you could be stuck in a school that is no longer the best by your ranking, or USN&WR's. Obviously, there's no disagreeing with the fact that more doors are open for you at the top of the rankings. But, you may determine that the emotional, economic, and/or physical cost of attending a school with a higher ranking is not worth the majority of those open doors, particularly since you can only go into one door at any time. I've had the pleasure of meeting many successful attorneys, both in BIGLAW and in boutiques, who have found (or perhaps forced) plenty of open doors. I would argue for the self-determined definition of "best". But, perhaps that's because it's the option I took, and I don't want to believe that I made the wrong choice.

That's just the 2 cents that my naive self has to offer on the subject.

Phew....

It's Friday night. I'm home for the entire weekend with only chores and work to do. No social engagements. No travel. No schedule. What a relief. The last few days have been tiring but amazing. A full day deposition of a very defensive inventor, trying to burn through some of the too huge pile work that I've committed to completing before my summer associate gig officially ends, and several long but ridiculously fun social events have left me drained.

As for having too much work to complete in not enough time--my associate colleagues assure me this is prep for my real life as a lawyer at my firm if I came back after school. Good thing I like the work...

Didn't Quite Make It...

I was doing a good job of keeping my work hours confined to the MF8-6 cage. Unfortunately, the end of my summer is approaching quickly and I have a petition to make special with a ridiculously long search report, several documents to produce for litigation, a deposition to attend, a HUGE office action, and if I finish all of that, a simple patent application they'd like me to squeeze in.

I do not have enough work days to finish. I've stopped accepting work, which is a good start, but I think I'm already in way over my head even if I give the patent application back. So, I'll be working late on Friday or over the weekend, or both. Oh well, I suppose one weekend out of several months isn't too bad.

Oh... and my alarm decided not to ring this AM (it's from 1984, time to replace, I suppose) so I woke, blissfully rested, at 10:34. Those lost hours are not helping my weekend schedule one bit.

Climate Control

Must the office be air-conditioned to a temperature that would require a sweater? Silly, wasteful, and most of all, it steals a piece of my summer.

Puh-leeze

Howard Berman, California Democrat, is at it again. He and John Conyers Jr. introduced a bill to make file-uploading a felony. Someone, somewhere, please have the common sense to make this disappear before it even becomes part of the debate.

Tech update

I've been slacking on posting tech stuff--I'm slammed with work. This attempt may look very familiar for those of you who spend time on slashdot.

DirecTV is suing everyone they can find who bought a smart-card programmer. The first class-action defense was lost and the members of the class were saddled with huge legal fees. RAD.

The House voted to block the FCC media consolidation rule. Should be interesting to see how this goes. Also should be interesting to see Lessig's take on it now that he's back and Dean's done blogging for him.

Looks like the search wars will be played out, at least partially, in court. Over patents. How does a self-respecting technophile who also happens to contribute to the body of software patents feel about this? Don't know. Still formulating my thoughts. The system is broken, most certainly. So broken that it does no good? Of course not. How do you reconcile these truths?

And lastly, to soothe my troubled soul, I think I'll try to get an interview with these guys at some point in my law school career.

Ahhh....

Sunburnt. Relaxed. Back at work.

Hindsight--It's always better to have a picture of the campgrounds before you go. The first night, we ended up next to the bathrooms in a very packed together site. At least we moved away from the bathrooms for night two. Next time, we'll have to do more recon and be sure to go to a place that has sites that are well-spaced (read--separate the loud neighbors from us, and vice versa). Of course, its easy to say "next time we'll..." and much harder to remember to do it--camping in the summer with only a month of lead time won't get you a reservation at most of the good California sites within easy driving of any metropolitan areas. Oh well, hindsight. We can hope that we'll pull it off better next year.

Perhaps the best thing about the trip besides friends at the fire was the empty hike. I can't remember the last time I took a gorgeous, well-maintained trail hike in California without encountering a single person. Oh, and the beach wasn't too bad. Come to think of it, neither was the weather. The fog, breeze, and haze (which had the politeness to clear up for the stars) were a welcome change from the sweltering heat of late at home.



The second best thing about the trip was this easy and delecious gourmet camping meal: Herb-Lemon-butter Salmon

Before you leave
Cut salmon into steaks. Place each steak, skin down, on its own large piece of aluminum foil. Cover each salmon steak with thin circular lemon slices. Place small chunks of butter in the spaces between the lemon slices. Shake garlic salt, oregano, sage, parsley, and black pepper over each steak. Fold the aluminum foil into sealed boats with a crease at the top.

At the campsite
Turn on the gas grill or create a good mound of coals below a grill for cooking over an open fire. Place the aluminum boats over the fire until they start steaming. Continue to cook, rotating to evenly heat the entire boat, for approximately 15 minutes (depends on the size of the steaks).

Law School Rant Numeros Uno y Dos

Well, I'm sure these are the first of many.

LSR No. Uno:

Can they really just refuse to release our booklist until orientation? Here I am, little blogging technophile, would like to buy used 1L books on-line to save money. There they are, for-profit bookstore and Law School, laughing at me for thinking I have an option. So here's the scam... They don't release the book list until orientation (see LSR No. Dos). They give out reading assignments during orientation, informing students that they will be expected to have completed the reading by the first day of class. The 1Ls, who are all fairly exciteable, quickly divide into two groups, those who are smugly proud of their book pre-ordering, and those that must stand in line at the bookstore during orientation. You will note that there is no group for people like me. Because in order to stay in my natural species group, I'd have to knowingly forgo finishing the reading for the first day of class. There is very little chance that I will find someone to sell me the appropriate 1L books, get them shipped, and finish the reading in 3-4 days. If you want to shop ahead of time, you can. But only at the Law School Bookstore, and only if you buy new books. Bastards! The worst part is, I may hate standing in line more than giving in to the man, so I'll probably end up pre-ordering too...

LSR No. Dos:

Orientation, a two-day affaire, is composed, at a minimum of 50% of sessions that don't interest me in the slightest. But, guess what? It's required. What the hell does that mean? I'm going to law school to learn the law, not to sit through a panel on how to find housing or a roommate. E and I are very content with our living situation, thank you very much.

Do not misunderstand me, I think it is excellent that they offer many of these panels for people who wish to attend them, but making it required? The dean's welcome speech is a required part of my legal education? Somehow I doubt that I'll find my legal education changed much by my attendance or lack thereof of most of these sessions. From what I hear, class isn't required. But orientation? Oh, that's really important!

There are, of course, a few sessions that I should find interesting. They just happen to be spaced out by a ridiculous amount of time, which I am free to fill by attending boring sessions, or perhaps, standing in line at the bookstore. I'm sure it won't be as bad as I'm making it out to be, but I really don't like being treated like a child on my first day of something that I've been looking forward to doing for several years. (Maybe I'm already hyper-sensitive to the fact that I will be older than most of my fellow students?) They are already using their knowledge of my booklist against me, and now they're requiring me to attend a two-day orientation that will probably present me with about 30 minutes of important, new information? Why 30 minutes, you say? Well, it's an educated guess from the letters from the law school sends, which repeat important facts ad nauseum. They expect us to be irresponsible and are going to start off our legal education by treating us thusly. RAD.

Halleluiah

Last night, I was made fun of for using Internet Explorer at work. At home and on my own laptop, I use Galeon. But, when confronted with a Windows PC that would be my work computer for 15 weeks, I lazily figured that the effort of installing any of my favorite open source software would be pointless. You see, I'm so convinced of Micro$oft's sucktitude that I assumed my life on Windows had to suck.

So, today, I finally installed Mozilla Firebird with the Windows Installer. Mozilla Firebird is the latest version of Netscape/Mozilla minus the chat client, mail client, and all the other stuff they throw in the normal distribution. I definitely suggest this wonderful software as a good trial to EVERYONE who has ever wanted to try out open source software, but didn't know where to start.

Benefits (aka, why I'm celebrating and why you should try it):

• The Google/DMOZ search bar is ready to go by default (click the search icon in the right to select Google or DMOZ)
  
• It is noticeably faster than IE on the slow connection at work. NOTICEABLY FASTER. Probably 25% faster.
  
• Tabbed browsing (Ctrl+T). If you haven't tried it, you should. I have cursed IE for its lack of tabs more than any other feature (and I didn't install mozilla, why?). Tabbed browsing is easily the best thing to happen to the browser market in the last 4 years.
  
• A Pop-up killer that is on by default (Tools-->Options-->Web Features). The time it took to install Firebird has already been recaptured in avoiding the pop-ups I would have had to close today if I hadn't installed it.
  
• An installer that is fast and works. Firebird runs immediately, even pulling the proxy data from IE's settings.
  
• It's free, and fights the power.
  

Okay, that's enough Mea Culpa and proselytizing for waiting this long to bail on IE. You should all make the switch, or at least try. It's sublime.

Update:

Of course, the bulletlists in bitingtonge look horrible. But, I generally prefer function over form.

The Good, the Funny, and the Wierd

The Good:

Wired is reporting that the Senate's 2004 version of the defense appropriations bill contains a clause that forbids any funds for Terrorism/Total Information Awareness.

The Funny:

Despite the resignation of the Junior Minister of Tourism, Stefano Stefani, the Germans are still picking fights with Italy. In other words, it's back on.

The Weird:

Calblog has lots to say about Arnold. After reading a few of his speeches, I agree with the Today's article in the Sacramento Bee--He does have a good story, as well as experience in real estate, show business, sports, government and the California Proposition System (broken as it may be). If he runs, he'll be a powerful candidate. Up until yesterday, I didn't doubt that he'd probably win for governor if he ran in one of the next few races, but I wasn't particularly excited about it. I was almost embarrassed--wacky California with their terminator governor. But, thanks to Calblog and reading more of Mr. Schwarzenegger's speeches, I'm actually refreshed at the idea of his entry into California Politics. Yup, that's weird.

Clever, Clever

Like Matrix-style action tricks? Check it out in live theater.

Why you might not want to upgrade to Windows Media Player 9

I didn't actually check the EULA for WMP 8, so perhaps this isn't new. However, I was surprised to see that the supplementary EULA contained the following details:

* Content providers are using the digital rights management technology contained in the OS Components ("DRM") to protect the integrity of their content ("Secure Content") so that their intellectual property, including copyright, in such content is not misappropriated. Portions of the OS Components and third party applications such as media players use DRM to play Secure Content ("DRM Software"). If the DRM Software’s security has been compromised, owners of Secure Content ("Secure Content Owners") may request that Microsoft revoke the DRM Software’s right to copy, display and/or play Secure Content. Revocation does not alter the DRM Software’s ability to play unprotected content. A list of revoked DRM Software is sent to your computer whenever you download a license for Secure Content from the Internet. You therefore agree that Microsoft may, in conjunction with such license, also download revocation lists onto your computer on behalf of Secure Content Owners. Microsoft will not retrieve any personally identifiable information, or any other information, from your computer by downloading such revocation lists. Secure Content Owners may also require you to upgrade some of the DRM components in the OS Components ("DRM Upgrades") before accessing their content. When you attempt to play such content, Microsoft DRM Software will notify you that a DRM Upgrade is required and then ask for your consent before the DRM Upgrade is downloaded. Third party DRM Software may do the same. If you decline the upgrade, you will not be able to access content that requires the DRM Upgrade; however, you will still be able to access unprotected content and Secure Content that does not require the upgrade.

Microsoft is slowly going to the model where the purchaser doesn't actually own their software or computer.

No one seems to care...

The Patriot Act scares the cr*p out of me. Slashdot's link to the I, Cringly's piece on electronic eavesdropping provides yet another reason why.

Why isn't this discussed in the mainstream media? It's no fun when people look at you like a wacked out conspiracy theorist when you try to convince them about what is actually happening today. Isn't anyone bothered by the fact that most people refuse to believe the carelessness of the government with respect to its citizens privacy rights simply because the reality seems too ridiculous to be true? Uggghh.... frustration.

Family Love

The junior minister of tourism apologized.

I'm still in the happy zone where the work I'm doing is interesting and varied. I feel like I should sing the praises of the partners for whom I'm working for giving me such great work to do. I also feel very naive and cute in my excitement. The whole picture is most certainly not as cool as my current perspective. But, for now, I'm loving it. Even today, a Friday, when I'd normally be doing the stuff I put off because it was boring, I'm not counting the hours to the weekend. Okay, well, not much anyways.

I have a feeling the last few weeks in the office are going to fly.

Sibling Rivalry

I'm not quite sure why, but I find an inordinate amount of pleasure in following the latest developments in the school-yard name-calling spat between Italy and Germany.

Anyone else going to join in? It seems like the French should be involved somehow, no?

On the work front, I've got a nice steady stream of work crossing my desk these days. It's varied and interesting, which I suspect is much more related to their desire to seduce me into the job than the reality of what an associate does on a day-to-day basis. I'm getting excellent feedback and my mentors as well as non-mentoring associates have been wonderful about answering my questions, not only those related to the firm, but also those related to the practice of law in general. My SA, in particular, has been helpful in answering my questions about possibly practicing a different type of law (which would necessitate my leaving the firm). Of course, he manages to do it in a way that spoils me with honesty, respect, openess, approachability, and what appears to be a geniune concern about me as a person. If that wouldn't make a person want to work somewhere, I don't know what would...

Update:

A friend turned me on to www.inpassing.org. Ahh... the random babblings of Berkeley are fabulous.
For example:

by Jen on 2003-07-09 19:14:06

Heard outside of Its A Grind Coffee House:
Guy with emo glasses-"Its not that problems don't exist, it's just that your problems don't necessarily exist in my realm of thinking. Nor mine in yours."
Girl with really really big hair-"Can you just dump me already, because I really have to get to work today."

Insulting

Lawrence Lessig points to some REALLY stupid anti-drug ads.

I want my tax dollars back.

The only appropriate response is a Simpson's quote, "This leash demeans us both."

Disturbing

Octodog.

Looking Up

Humor came to rescue my yesterday when one of the support staff got her shirt sleeve caught in the manual feeder of the printer. She was attached to the printer for at least 15 minutes. We all tried to help. We eventually made a service call to get a professional to free her from captivity. I noticed that she was wearing a sleeveless shirt today...

Turns out the missing assignment was pulled from my desk. I have it back now. Phew... one less bad impression.

And, in the news, the 9th Circuit handed down Kelly V. Arriba Soft Corp. They found that a search engine that published thumbnails of a copyrighted work was not violating copyright, mainly because the the thumnails were a transformative use, and they couldn't be used for the original aesthetic, artistic, purpose of the work.

The two largest things I'm taking away from this case:

1. Why would an artist sue a search engine for linking to their images. Isn't that good for your art? More eyeballs?

2. Word of the day: militate. As in, "While wholesale copying does not preclude fair use per se, copying an entire work militates against a finding of fair use." [Worldwinde Church of God, F.3d at 1118]

Making a Bad Impression

So far today, I've:

a) Walked into a training session held by one of the very senior partners after he had started presenting. Even though I was fairly certain that I was 3 minutes early, I was, by all counts, late. At least I had on a suit.

b) Miscalculated not one, but two, simple math estimates during the training and gave not one, but two, incorrect answers out loud because I never get mental math wrong. Raaaiiighhht, except on Mondays. In the morning. In front of a senior partner. When I got the first one wrong, he actually said, "Come on guys," and looked at me as if to say, "If you don't know how to do the math, then keep your mouth shut." Oh. Right. Except I didn't.

c) Either, misplaced, or had an assignment taken away from me while I was away on vacation. I'm leaning towards misplaced, which is awesome. I have one last place to look, where I may have left it at home. If it's not there then I'd better pray that either the partner or his assistant came and removed it from my desk on Thursday because it is nowhere to be found in my office. Of course, neither of them are in today, so there's no way to verify whether they actually removed it. In fact, there's no way to verify whether the file wrapper and prosecution history that I requested have been ordered and or arrived. And the assignment is due back to the client (not the partner) in the next couple of days.

d) (Yesterday) Been informed that it's not Justice SKAL-i-ya, it's Justice Scal-I-ya. Silly me, I never thought about it while I was saying it, but I guess my mouth figured it would be prounounced like "figlia" or "Italia". I'm still not convinced that the mainstream pronunciation is correct (just like most of the latin used in law gets butchered), but I suppose that until Antonin himself tells me otherwise, I might as well go along with the majority. Just another thing to add to the idiot bucket (where my mathematical mistakes, ass-SIGN-ee, and APP-el-late are hanging out).

Blogger's Editor Sucks

If you accidentally click the Posts tab instead of "Post" while using Mozilla, you will see a pop-up prompting, "would you like to delete all of your work?" I encourage you to click "Yes," since I just chose "No" and my work was lost to the ages. Perhaps no means yes and yes means no. If not, I stand by the title of this entry.

Other mentionable tidbits from this weekend:

• Newark: 80 degrees, 100% humidity


• Phoenix: 109 degrees, who cares about the humidity


• Las Vegas: 101 degrees at 11 PM


• I ask you, if you were a rich industrial capitalist, would you put a summer home in any of these locations? And yet, someone did and it was a gorgeous venue for a wedding. So, thanks be to silly industrial capitalists, or whoever it was!


• At least 4 of E's friends have plans that include law school


• E's friend, S, stayed sober long enough to give the best wedding toast I've ever heard (not a difficult bar to cross).


• Word to the wise, don't start the evening with the hard stuff. S's girlfriend, L, started the hot summer night with martinis after playing tennis in the humidity and sun. She praised the skills of our waiter, Branco, as he brought her a new martini, without prompting, for every half of one she finished. I can only assume that she was not so impressed with him the next morning.


• Literary/Historical Notes from Thomas Jefferson's writings--British and French pounds were separate units requiring conversion (go metric system), "it's" was actually the posessive of it, written french had some bizarre tenses, and various agreements were approached with the countries of Tuscany, Rome, Napoli, the two Sicilies, and Venice. Negotiating with multiple Italies? See the previous post...

Bumbling Berlusconi

Somehow, he always manages to make the most appalling mistakes imagineable. And yet, he's still the richest man in Italy, their PM, and at least for the time being, the president of the EU. How does that work?

All Prepped

The bags are packed. The red-eye will be boarded this evening. I should get some sleep tonight/this morning before work today before the flight tonight in order to appropriately enjoy myself. But, instead I'm writing uninteresting tidbits into the blogger editing panel. Huh, I wonder what that says about my desire to conform?

I've enjoyed the busy-ness of preparing for this trip--hotel and flight reservations, 1 long weekend shopping trip with E in the summer heat for the sake of finding the perfect attire, 1 tuxedo rented over the phone, 3 trips to the tailor, innumerable calls to Brooks Brothers (who handled their most recent sale and resulting increase in business horribly) for complaints and questions, two pieces of luggage packed, various toiletries, books and gadgets collected and stowed, and, of course, excitement over the prospect of meeting some of E's friends for the first time--I hope the actuality is even more enjoyable than the build-up.

Well, off to sleep goes I. Tomorrow should be a long exercise in stuffing the remaining bathroom necessities into the already bulging luggage, trying to focus on deposition summaries and patent evaluations, followed by lunch with co-workers, followed by still more attempted focus on the many assignments on my desk, and finally, freedom in the air, which will end the morning of the next day on the East Coast with me amongst people I've never met in order to celebrate a wedding on the 4th of July.

In a related vein: A clever male friend, who's a bit too young in the soul to consider marriage a desireable thing, pointed out the sadness of getting hitched on Independence Day. I laughed.

Tech Update

Infoworld has an interesting article about the Supreme Court's refusal to grant cert. on a case regarding a CAD software patent and EULA dispute. The patent issue doesn't appear to be a big deal, but Infoworld claims this case may open the door for enforcing EULAs for breach of contract.

The Bowers case is an example of a good plaintiff -- in this case, an independent software developer going up against a bigger company -- not contributing to good law, she added. "This guy's got to be the most sympathetic plaintiff in the world," Copenhaver said. "This is the kind of guy you really want to protect."

The Register has an article disagreeing with my assessment that Software business interests don't appear to hold as much clout in the EU as media corporations do in the US. Should be interesting to see what happens come September 30.

Manic Monday

Did you know that the Bangles are still alive and kicking?

I'm tired. Stupidly, I didn't go to bed as early as I should have last night. I'm paying for it today. Oh well, what else is new?

Bag and Baggage informed me of the 78 page Intel V. Hamadi decision. I'll probably print it and add it to the half-read pile containing Gratz and Grutter.

The hilarity of the fact that I'm behind on my pleasure case reading is not escaping me. We'll call it prep for law school.

Thankfully, I have a two long flights to the East Coast and a few days of unplanned time during my Fourth of July trip. Ahhh...blissful reading time. Maybe I'll make myself finish the cases before I immerse myself in my other books. Nah...I'll probably just go straight into Jefferson's Writings, and take breaks from it to continue my treks through the bite sized chunks of fun in the Science Fiction Short Story Anthology (that R lent me over 6 months ago), and Metamagical Themas.

The cases will be good for when I'm killing time at work. Which, by the way, is not right now. Enough with the blog.

Spam update

The SPAM experiment has returned some results. BEWARE to all who post their email address on the Web. So far, I've received:

An email titled "The Messiah Comes" from "Signs from God." It's comical and uncomprehensible (serious translation problems, methinks). It links to more comical mad German ramblings here.

A version of the Nigerian Advance Fee Fraud from danjumauseni3@mail.co.za aka Danjuma Useni.

Two emails from a sina.com address that use a characterset unsupported by hotmail.

TGIS

So, my friday with no plans morphed into a long drive to go hang out in my home town with my family. I had a home town family party where my attendance was required on Saturday (and, by extension, E had to go as well). Originally, E and I had planned to drive on Saturday AM, go to the party, stay the night and drive back on Sunday. But, on Friday night, better sense prevailed (thanks in no small part to my sister-in-law) and we realized that driving at night was much preferable given the 100+ degree weather. So, my friday of no plans became friday of packing, driving, and orchestrating details. Cold beer and cool night temperatures greated our arrival and confirmed our good decision.

The family party was fun, but hot. My father was happy because first of all, he loves a good party, and second of all of his children and his grand-child made all of the necessary appearances and gestures. We shook hands, hugged, and repeated the easily understood details of our lives, "I'll be going to law school in the fall." Having a niece to run interference at the event was a strategic coup. Much less was required of us children than used to be. Bless my brother and his fertile sperm.

After the party, we waited out the heat and drove home. So, now it's Sunday and I can finally relax like I had planned to do on Friday.

TGIF

Today was a busy, busy day. It came on the tail end of a busy, busy week. I'm very glad to have NO plans for tonight.

Despite learning an important lesson on Wednesday, I managed to repeat it in a new form today by claiming a system as a whole instead of claiming the one novel component. Who infringes a claim to the system? The customer. Who infringes claims to the one novel component? The manufacturer. Who would the client rather have protection from? Duh. I'll keep repeating the lesson here as long as it takes me to learn it.

In other news, five grammar questions earned me this (my bruised ego will take the positive reinforcement anywhere it can find it...):

[take the test] - [by krystaljungle.com]

Thanks to JCA for the link.

If you are any kind of grammar dork, you must see Bob's Quick Guide to the Apostrophe, You Idiots!. I laugh harder each time I see it.

Trackback

It's a good thing I celebrated the garlic fries last night because I certainly am not celebrating them right now (neither, I imagine, are my co-workers).

Yesterday's post about avoiding claims that only your customers infringe seems particularly germane in light of the RIAA's latest plan to sue hundreds of file-swappers. RIAA is making more and more friends every day. Can you say "desperate, last-straw, attempt to squeeze blood from the stone of the old music industry business model"?

And finally, at the risk of cursing myself, I almost feel comfortable at the firm today. Like I actually may be getting a clue (gasp)! Sure, yesterday's mistake was huge, but I fixed it in short time and out to the client it went with only one word edited on my second draft. Hmmm... a good sign.

Raindrops on Roses and...

Let's not talk about how the team performed. Instead, let us celebrate the wonderful dinner of Gilroy Garlic Fries and beer. Ahhh, these are some of my favorite things...

Today's Lesson

If the only way you find to get around the cited references is by adding operating conditions to your claims, keep thinking. The people who infringe will be your customers. Not a good way to make friends. And I was so proud that I found a way to make claims that were distinguished over the prior art.

Back to the drawing board.

One Percent?

Even though everyone said the Feds would do it. I'm shocked.

Zaurus returned

My 2nd Zaurus arrived yesterday. Audio quality is good and the MP3 player works. Now, I can finally get down to business on the very important task of ripping my MP3 collection for my commute to school.

In short, I was upset that the first one didn't work. But, I was happy that the on-line vendor accepted my return and sent me a new one, although it did take approximately 2 weeks and I had to pay for return shipping. I guess that's what you get for bargain hunting.

Realization

I have no friends at work.

Okay, so that's not entirely true. I have acquaintances at work with whom I am friendly. But we only exchage brief words on a daily basis. The sum of all my non-work conversations is about 10 minutes per day. I'm not one to need tons of face-to-face interaction, but 10 minutes in 8+ hours? It would be preferable even just to have interesting work-related conversations on a daily basis. I can maintain my active social life outside of the office, no problem. It's being there for hours on end without any human stimulation that's difficult. I suppose it would be different if I had so much interesting work to do that I barely noticed the lack of conversation. But, alas, as previous posts have indicated, that is not the life of a summer associate, even one in my shoes. Hence, this blog...

Of course, I didn't realize that I had no friends at work until the other night when out with friends of mine who work together. They discussed their day, and the surprising feeling of jealousy showed me that some of the malcontent I feel at work has absolutely nothing to do with the work. At every job prior to this one, I've had at least one work friend with whom I could commiserate, go to lunch, and laugh. Here, it's heads down for all, and there's no one with whom I've particularly bonded. I sit in the busiest, and therefor quietest, corner of the office. There are no other summer associates or younger associates near me. It's not as if I haven't gone to lunch on occasion with a few of the associates, but definitely less often than once a week.

Unfortunately, while I can say that this malaise has nothing to do with the work, that's not entirely true. Patent prep and pros is a quiet, heads down job. The people who do it are generally introverts. I sit on that edge between introvert and extrovert. I need more interaction than I'm getting here. The days I get to go to client sites or training are the days I enjoy the most. That realization alone is worth the summer. If I accept a job that is entirely patent prep and pros without any litigation or other legal work to spice it up, I run a serious risk of being unhappy.

Again, I find myself grateful that I'm not in a normal summer associate job. If I was, I'd be getting enough lunch invitations that I'd never notice the reality of the office and I might not understand how it could make me unhappy.

Supreme Court UMich Admissions Decision

Jurist reports that the UMich affirmative action decisions are now available. The Law School Opinion, where the law school's affirmative action policy was ruled constitutional by 5-4 is 95 pages. The Undergraduate School Opinion where the University of Michigan's college of Letters, Arts, and Sciences point-based admissions policy was struck down by a 6-3 vote is 68 pages.

A friend of mine, D, just graduated from the University of Michigan Law School and was one of the authors of the amicus brief that the law school submitted. While she obviously had an opinion, she was receptive to my concerns that the point system was too blatant and seemed somehow unfair. Each time that she and I discussed the issue, we both agreed that it's an ugly problem with no easy answers. Someone is going to be left out. Choosing that someone is never an easy thing. We both believe that people who claim that it's a simple problem with an obvious solution are blind to, ignoring, or just not aware of some of the important points.

I am happy that by the numbers, it appears the the Justices understand the complexity of the problem and didn't find it easy to make a unanimous decision in either case. I think I want to live in a world that allows for moderate preferences based on socio-economic disadvantages. Defining moderate is the problem. The UMich point system seemed to go to far, in my opinion. But, from what I understood about the law school's policy, I'm not certain that it was bad or good policy. I believe that if it's not obviously bad policy (again, difficult to define), we should leave it to the educational systems, employers, etc. to offer moderately preferential treatment to socio-economically disadvantaged people as they chose. In short, I think I'm happy about today's decisions. But, I need to read the opinions in full before I can completely commit to that statement.

More on SCO

First and foremost, the most informative source of info that I've found on SCO vs. IMB is the twiki.iwethey.org SCO vs. IBM page--Detailed background and appears to be updated very regularly.

Ian Lance Taylor has an excellent summary at Linux Journal of what he's allowed to say about his visit to SCO as an analyst.

His opinions about the code he was shown were particularly interesting:

Here is what I think I can say about the code I saw. The code is fairly trivial--the kind of stuff I wrote in school. The similar portions of the code were some 80 lines or so. Looking around the Net, I found close variants of the code, with the same comments and variable names, in sources other than Linux distributions. The code is not in a central part of the Linux kernel. The code does not appear to have been contributed to Linux by SCO or Caldera. The code exists in current versions of the Linux kernel.

The real question is, how easy will it be for litigators to make this point, or mutate this point into nothingness, before a judge and/or jury.

Also interesting are his feelings in response to the code:

I admit that SCO's example unsettled me by what it implies. Although in itself trivial, it does suggest that some Linux contributors may have been careless about copyright infringement. That is unfortunate.

And finally, his comments on the mutually assured destruction that he sees software patents to be are particularly fascinating:

It's worth noting that the people running SCO and their lawyers may not appreciate the power of software patents. In my experience, few people outside the profession understand the degree to which every program of any scope violates patents. The software industry today survives only through an unstated agreement not to stir things up too much. We must hope this lawsuit isn't the big stirring spoon.

In the same vein, Gary L. Reback's Summer '02 article on the patent system is sobering and depressing.

Is there a way to define a career for yourself as a patent litigator and/or prosecutor who only fights bad patents or prosecutes good ones? Unfortunately, much like criminal defense, I think the answer is no. The system is supposed to work, and it only works if the players do their best regardless of where they are placed in the field. But, perhaps my conscience will take enough of a beating that I'll actually try to find a career for myself where I fight the good fight. Given that in the last two years I've tried to volunteer with the EFF twice (as both a technical volunteer and legal volunteer for free) and I haven't even gotten an email reply, I imagine that positions for qualified lawyers fighting the good fight that pay enough money to support a family are few and far between.

Summer Madness

This week was a whirlwind of client site disclosure meetings, training, training rescheduled, firm and non-firm social events, the office action I still haven't finished, more preliminary invalidity contention charts, and not enough sleep. I have no plans for tonight but a vague idea of a stop at the gym and some food. And off to bed early.

The rest of the weekend is a tsunami of firm and non-firm social commitments including 2 barbeques, which will total 3 in 4 days. The only weekends before school without travel or multiple major social commitments are July 12th and July 26th. That's it. Every other weekend is guaranted to be fun and fatiguing to the point of exhaustion. This happens every summer. I love summer fun so much that I forget to say no, even when I should.

If you are a blog addict, you will laugh at Robert Scoble's Simple guide to A-list bloggers.

The future of EU patents

Infoworld has a summary of the upcoming debate about the EU patent standard. Looks like the US and Japan may end up with a less stringent standard for patentable software. Discussion at slashdot.

I find it interesting that media corporations were very efficient at getting the US to move copyright extension in line with European Term Limits (or at least that was their claim). Software business interests don't appear to hold as much clout in the EU as media corporations do in the US.

Experiment

Today was a gorgeous day. I had 3 reference patents, an application, and an office action to read and highlight in prep for making a response. I also had a headache. I packed up my bag and left for home at 2:30. The receptionist asked if I was coming back and I said, "Nope."

Ibuprofen, sun, all my reading is done, plus a little yoga and my headache is gone. I'm also done with the work earlier than I would have been if I had tried to finish it in the office since I undoubtedly would have distracted myself with something online. That's one good thing about working in the sun. Not much else to do if you only bring your water and your reading material.

The experiment is this--will anyone other than the receptionist
A) notice or be informed that I took off?
B) care?
C) request that I not do so again?
D) none of the above?

I think it's a useful test. If they go for D, it's just another point in their favor. A-C I'll explain my way through, it's not like I accomplished anything less than I would had I stayed. I suspect that it will be D, but only because my Supervising Attorney is out today and its unlikely that any of the others stopped by to give me work. Unfortunately, the life of a summer associate is not usually so relaxed. In general, it is my job to be there when and if they need me. I deal so poorly with this notion...control freak that I am...this summer is a learning experience in more ways than one.

Bullfighter

Hate marketing-jargon-fluff-MBA-speak?

Check this out. The irony of the source is easily half the joke.

IBM's curt responses

IBM's response to SCO's revocation of the AIX license is three paragraphs of concise english like, "IBM's Unix license is irrevocable, perpetual and fully paid up. It cannot be terminated. This matter will eventually be resolved in the normal legal process. "

Their 18-page response to the Utah filing was just as terse, if I remember correctly.

I change my opinion. This isn't going to get much uglier, fast. It's going to get uglier, slowly. I predict that if they don't settle, the case will not be finished before I'm out of school (May 2006).

Cahones

Word on the street is that SCO actually revoked (or at least tried) IBM's AIX license.

This should get much uglier. Fast.

Funny Stuff for Monday

I laughed so hard at what was probably Jeff Goldblum's big break... a 2 second speaking part in Annie Hall, (Whining into a huge white phone in the middle of a very L.A. party) "I forgot my mantra."

My apologies to the person who followed the best Google referral so far: "poker mistress tongue." No doubt they were quite disappointed.

And, in the champagne category... I finally have an inbound link, according to technorati. Wierd that Blogger's changes.xml doesn't take template edits into consideration. I'd imagine that the best algorithm would be one that ranks template links higher than in-line links. But, what do I know? Anyways, thanks to Bag and Baggage for the link. It's great to finally be somebody.

Back to work--navigating corporate phone systems in order to harass engineers for details and the every-quarter-hour-walk down the hall to see if the partner that I'm working for is free (hint--statistics say no) to go over my latest stuff.

Glorious Weekend Weather

Ahhh... sun. By Sunday morning I am already as relaxed as I usually am by Sunday night. The french decontracter is exactly how I relax. I start tightly wound, and over the course of hours of friends, food, wine, sun, sleep, reading, movies, and whatever else I do between Friday PM and Monday AM, I loosen. My muscles clench less. My stomach churns less. My head spins webs of thought-traps less. And eventually, I am completely un-contracted.

Over the course of Monday AM to Friday PM, with breaks in the evenings, I re-contract. And the cycle repeats. I suppose the ideal would be to attain a state of existence where I swung less on the pendulum. Perhaps one day...

I'm in an interesting place with regards to my summer associate gig. From other summers I talk to, it seems that I'm doing more work, I have more expected of me, and I'm having less fun/wining and dining than most. But then again, my situation isn't exactly normal. I think I prefer the way I'm doing it. I may be more stressed than the others, but I also think I'm getting a better idea of the real life of an associate at my firm than those in summer programs that cloister the summers into a cocoon world of splendor. Who knows. Maybe I'll try to get one of those gigs for at least one summer so that I, too, can enjoy the excess. But, from the stories I've heard, the more they wine and dine you, the more likely they are to work you to death if you sign on after your JD.

Given how great I feel today, I am concerned that school or future work may not allow me my 2/7 of the week recovery. I suppose, like everything else, that problem will resolve itself in its own time.

Today, I'm just relaxing.

Almost Google Whack

Google hit of the day: "cardio soup".

I thought it was a google whack, but apparently two words in quotes don't count. Huh...Cardio soup? One can only imagine.

In other news, I went to a long leisurely lunch with a friend this afternoon to celebrate the fact that she is halfway through her M.S. in Mechanical Engineering. I took surface streets instead of one of the many freeways between me and the restaurant. Big mistake. If I ran the world, many more street lights would be timed. Thankfully, D is an amazing girl of infinite patience and when I did arrive, she merely commented on how happy she was to bask in the sun.

We were seated in one of the dining rooms of PF Chang's and proceeded to enjoy our meal. Something wasn't quite right, but I wasn't certain what it was. The decor was not offensive. The staff was competent. The food was excellent. Oh, right, we were SHOUTING at each other. As soon as I realized just how bad the accoustics were, every noise increased my awareness. A fork lightly dropped on a plate was magnified into a loud bell. Each chair scoot was a tractor plowing. When I commented on the horrid accoustics to D, she laughed and said, "Yeah. You know, I've worked at work sites that were quieter than this but were required to make employees to wear ear-plugs due to the noise level." Poor Friday lunch servers, they will probably suffer hearing loss. I left a big tip. I also won't be going back there. Except maybe for take-out and then off to the park.

Slashdot recently linked to A question and answer session with Lawrence Lessig and Matt Oppenheim of the RIAA. The question and answer session is worth reading.

I get paid to read this?

While some of the work I've been doing lately is repetitive, boring, and uninspiring, I love that at times I get paid to read US Supreme Court opinions. A very elated me just spend an hour reading, digesting and applying Graham v. John Deere Co.--a brief history of the patent system and the test for non-obviousness all rolled into one 8-page opinion.

The references to Jefferson in Graham pushed me over the edge. I caved in and ordered Thomas Jefferson : Writings : Autobiography / Notes on the State of Virginia / Public and Private Papers / Addresses / Letters. I think the title could use a little work, but that doesn't mean I'm any less excited about devouring it.

Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of
society. It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual
brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property. ...He who
receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who
lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely
spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man,
and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently
designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without
lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have
our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then
cannot, in nature, be a subject of property. Society may give an exclusive right to the
profits arising from them, as an encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may
produce utility, but this may or may not be done, according to the will and convenience
of the society, without claim or complaint from anybody.

--VI Writings of Thomas Jefferson, at 180-81 (Washington ed.).

Google Hits

Unlike other blawgers who seem to get hits somewhat relevant to the content they post. I keep getting people from searches like "biting tounge in sleep". I suppose that by writing about this, I will only increase the likelihood that those hits will keep coming. What an interesting self-referential problem I am.

On Hold

So, despite several rave reviews of the sound quality of the Zaurus mp3 player, mine has a barely audible stream of sound that is unable to be altered from the volume panel. Everything else seems to work just fine (address book, calendar, to-do list, etc.)

I called the support line for Zaurus. Navigated the phone system. 24 minutes on hold, and then the system hung up on me. Okay, I can deal with this... I called back. Pressed zero for an operator and asked to be put through to Zaurus support. He did so, I went back into the horrible music hold loop and was hung up on after 14 mintues of waiting. I'm on hold number 3 right now, the system said I should be on hold for 9 minutes. It's been 10:46. I don't have much hope. But, I guess that's what speakerphone is for.

Back to work/hold.

Woo-Hoo

My Zaurus arrived!

Attitude Adjustment

I friend of mine mentioned that he was concerned about the stress of the law firm getting to me. And I suppose that in the wake of my recent health issues it is a fair concern. Of course, I like what I'm doing and immediately tried to qualify the stress I'm under as something that will no longer exist when I'm a real associate at a firm, should I choose to become one.

The things that I find most stressful as a summer associate are (in no particular order):

1. Being held to a 40-hour work week instead of a "project-is-finished" work schedule.
2. Sitting at my desk and doing nothing in order to fulfill #1 when I have finished my projects and am waiting for feedback or more work.
3. Not being empowered to make decisions about my own time management when the people who are empowered are generally too busy to do so.
4. The fact that, no matter how they try to hide it, it really is a long-as-hell interview.
5. The fact that social events are a requirement, again, regardless of how they try to hide it.

If you look at those complaints, they are pretty minor. In fact, they most likely comprise a shorter list than the one I would have come up with at my previous position in the real world where I did have some power to make decisions and manage my own time. The hilarious fact is that being a summer associate is not any more stressful than any other situation I've been in, I've just been focusing on things I dislike. Every day that I could have taken my work home but instead had to sit in the office and work for face time, I have made a point of thinking about how much I'd rather work at home and how stupid it was that I had to stay. Of course, I stayed anyways because that is what I'm supposed to do. So, basically, I'd just waste a few minutes of each "unnecessary" hour in the office being annoyed. I'd look at the real associates and seeth with jealousy of their freedom. Of course, it doesn't help that I'm roughly the same as the younger associates in terms of age and professional experience (many of them have significantly less experience than me).

But, I am happy to report that as of this weekend, I realize just how dumb I was being. I really wanted this job. I'm very lucky to have it (who gets a summer associate position before they go to law school?). In order to have this job, I had to give up the ability to decide the exact schedule of my work, and the rewards of being efficient. I did it unknowingly, but I'm still lucky to have this job and I still like it. The grass on the associate side of the fence is greener, but that's a good thing. I'd rather put up with things that annoy me for 3 summers than for the rest of my life.

And as for the social events and the long interview. Those things I did know about ahead of time. I did sign up for them. And really, they are true of just about any job in the world that I would take, even if the other jobs are better at pretending. It's not like working as a contractor, consultant, or even full-time employee is really any different than a very long interview. And, it's also not like beers with the boss is ever actually an optional event.

No appropriate term

The Love of My Life. Life Partner. Soulmate. Significant Other. -- I have one of those. We have a very strong commitment to one another and will probably augment that commitment with a legal marriage one day (assuming the marriage tax repeal becomes permanent). In the mean time, I have a hard time coming up with a term that is appropriate in professional conversations. While I view our commitment as just as binding as a legal contract, I can't actually use wife/husband and be telling the truth. Boyfriend and girlfriend makes me feel and sound childish. All the others make me feel as if I'm hiding my sexual orientation. I just want a term that is the truth and that doesn't immediately cause someone to look at me and think, "ah, yes, I thought you were young".

Options

On Friday, I spoke with an associate who's leaving my firm. I picked his brain about working for the government (which he did for 6 years) vs. the firm vs. in-house, where he's going. He was full of useful pointers and anecdotes.

One story in particular caught my attention:

They always say that if you join a firm you should stay for at least a year. If you leave before the one-year mark, it looks bad and you probably haven't learned enough to know whether or not you actually like it. But, there are exceptions.

I had a friend who went to work for a BIGLAW firm out of school. He hated it. By month 9 he was actively interviewing for any other position he could find and the firm let him go. Today, he's in Burmuda as in-house counsel to an insurance firm. I'd say it worked out okay for him...

Lesson Learned

When given 3 projects of roughly equal priority, do not finish them in order of interest. I have no one but myself to blame for the fact that I'm spending my Friday trying to keep myself interested in the most boring work I've done this week.

Survey of Life on a Friday

Negatives: slight dizzy spells and nausea, uninspiring project

Positives: Health much better, 6 hours 'til freedom, classical music, gorgeous weather, casual dress, Zaurus on its way, family and friends all doing well, too many other things to list...

First Client Feedback

Yesterday, I dropped a completed Response to Office Action on my supervising attorney's desk. It was so DONE, and I felt excellent.

Except, of course, it wasn't done. My SA walked into my office and said, "Counsel." He then lightly tossed the document on my desk. It was open to a page where he had circled a portion of one of my arguments and questioned why I had introduced that limitation to the prosecution history. He was right. Another page showed a similar error. The interesting thing to me was my reaction to the word "Counsel." No one had ever called me counsel before (well, duh). But, I guess I am counsel to this client. I will be signing this correspondence with my own USPTO registration number. The full weight of that word, coupled with the mistakes I had been completely unaware of was impressive. I have quite a bit of power to REALLY screw up. And I don't know enough to stop myself from doing it. Useful lesson.

As soon as I looked at what he had circled, I knew what I had done wrong. I doubt I'll make mistakes as blatant like as that anytime in the near future (but then again, who knows, I was proud of the draft I gave him).

The story has a very happy ending, though. I fixed the document according to his comments and cleaned up a few of the arguments even further. When I brought him draft 3, he read it quickly and leaned back in his chair, saying, "Not Bad. Not Bad." If I've learned anything about him over the last few weeks it's that "not bad" is a compliment.

I sent the document to our client. His response was full of elixir to my bruised ego in the form of phrases like, "very distinct and well described" and the "remarks are just great".

So, the milestone of sending work to a client has been passed. In fact, it was passed with flying colors thanks in no small part to the vigilance of my SA. I think I'm enjoying myself a little bit here...

Still on the mend

For someone who prides themselves on a superb immune system (although my doctor pointed out that it could just be a superb tolerance for pain and my stubborness) getting over my current health issues is a serious drag. Obviously, I'm thankful that my health is otherwise fine and that these issues are transient. But, boy, there is nothing to make you appreciate just how good you have it than to suffer from pain, lingering infections, and fatigue (not to mention the restricted diet for a month) for two weeks plus. One particularly interesting side effect is that any image issues I may have been heading towards have been completely eradicated. Yup, I probably have gained a few pounds over the last few years. Yup, I probably would look better if I lost them and increased my muscle tone. But do I feel bad about how I look? Hell no! When my current health issues are completely gone (I had a slight taste of freedom yesterday but a relapse this AM) I will be elated with my returned health and VERY comfortable in my skin.

It's sad that I had to get sick to be reminded of just how silly our societal fixation on appearance is. It's also sad that despite what I'd like to think, I'm not immune from societal pressures. I probably have it better off than most in terms of exposure to societal pressures, but I've still got some minute issues. How much worse is it for the attractive teenage TV-a-holic wanna-be model? Bummer

PDA hunt complete

After much soul-searching between reading pages of Festo, I made up my mind. The Zaurus should arrive in 2 days. Woo-hoo. I can't wait to rip myself a decent MP3 collection of classical music for the commute to school. For those of you who are interested, I couldn't take any more of a risk than I'm already taking by going with an upstart OS in the PDA category. The YOPY is probably pretty cool, but I'm going to have enough trouble getting what I need out of the OpenZaurus community without having to deal with internationalization issues and early-adopter issues that will undoubtedly plague the YOPY for another 6 months to a year. Perhaps the next gen will be a YOPY, but I think the Zaurus will get me through the next three years of school just fine.

More on the PDA hunt

So, the PDA hunt continues as the remaining pages of my paper calendar dwindle. At this point, I think I'm leaning towards the Zaurus. Although the newest versions of the YOPY look oh-so-cool, they are a bit expensive. But, they have a car charger. What I'm actually suffering from is the fact that the longer I wait, the cooler and cheaper the gadgets will be. But...I actually NEED (or at least want enough to purchase in the next month) a PDA. One route I could go is to get a cheap palm for now and just wait. But the MP3 player... it's calling my name.

Here's what I'm comparing so far:

YOPY	Zaurus SL-5500
$499 4.0 X 2.7 X 0.75 in 6.0 oz. 128 MB RAM ARM linux w/package manager handwriting recognition bigger keyboard fold-out/protected screen Can't read the User Manual due to a font problem Other Korean/English small user community problems	$360 2.9 x 5.4 x 0.7 in. 6.8 oz. 64 MB RAM Embedded linux--package manager if OpenZaurus User Community/OpenZaurus/software Comes with: USB connected cradle; AC adapter

Petition to Reclaim the Public Domain

As I mentioned in an earlier post (to which I'd love to link, but I've been too lazy to get archives working on blogger) Lawrence Lessig's plan to introduce a bill that charges minimal maintenance fees for copyright will most likely spawn a niche market of copyright maintenance service providers. However, it is a step in the right direction to point out that we need SOME solution to the problem of copyrighted content held captive by the law (not at the owner's choice). So, I suggest you go take a look at the Petition to Reclaim the Public Domain and add your name if the idea strikes you as better than the current situation.

One good, One bad

Decreased Regulation of Media Ownership made it through the FCC in a 3-2 (Republicans vs. Democrats) vote. Frustrating

The Supreme Court reversed the judgement of the 9th Circuit in Dastar v. Fox in what appears to be a nice big win for fair use. Note that the previous link points to SCOTUSblog, and not the unanimous opinion penned by Justice Scalia.

Still need bed rest

But, I'm doing that American thing and working a full hard day today to make up for the work I missed. I still have the two projects I took home on thursday (nothing accomplished thus far) as well as the additional work tossed on my desk this AM. But, it's interesting work, so It's not too bad. I'll just crash when I get home.

In other news, who would have thought that they'd ever find Eric Rudolf. My boy from Atlanta claims that while camping in the woods in 1996 or 1997 the FBI showed up looking for Eric on the run. They never found him, but my boy tells of bumper stickers and plenty of back-woods support. Appalachian wierd.